1. Field
The following description relates to a door lock apparatus, and more particularly, to a door lock apparatus used to lock or release a door of an electronic product.
2. Description of the Related Art
A drum washing machine which is a kind of electronic product includes a large aperture in a front side through which to put laundry and a door mounted therein to open or close the aperture. Upon operation, a drum of the drum washing machine washes the laundry with a head force and a friction force while rotating centered on a horizontal axis. Such a drum washing machine includes a door lock apparatus to automatically lock the door in order to prevent the door from opening during washing. If the door opens during washing, the laundry and detergent water solutions may be discharged out of the machine, so that the washing operation is stopped and in the worse case an accident involving personal injury may occur by the rotating drum.
The door lock apparatus needs to be configured with a relatively simple structure to ensure high reliability and safety so that the long-term use of the door does not cause incorrect operations such as the case where a little impact makes the door easily open. In addition, in the case of an emergency, such as the situation where the door is required to be opened quickly during washing or the case where the door is locked due to an electricity failure, the door lock apparatus has to be able to be manually released by using a certain release member.
When an emergency occurs during washing, if a user tries to forcibly open the door without releasing the locked state using the release member, the case occurs where only a hook of the door is detached from a rocker of the door lock apparatus while the rocker maintains in its current position. Since the detached hook cannot be again inserted into the rocker, the door lock apparatus has to be replaced with a new one in order to close the door. Accordingly, a new door lock apparatus capable of solving the problem is needed.